Huntsman - A good career, but

Warhammer: Vermintide 2 Gameplay Feedback
41

monkaHmm
That’s sound like not being able to perform good at multiple tasks is his slot.

42

If skill dependance means that you cant get tHP then idk what to tell.

43

I could agree. It is ok to have a weapon good vs specials and vs bosses (longbow) and another one better vs bosses but worse vs specials (hagbane)… the problem is that this “worse damage vs bosses” happens also with other weapons like xbow, volley xbow, beam staff; weapons that they are good also vs specials!

Then I could also add that a WS hagbane can kill specials thanks her active and that HandM hagbabe is still a tank/crowd control career, she must not kill specials like a ranged one… but, as I have already said, the main problem is not hagbane but the general situation.

44

I agree. It would be possibile write a book about this, but to be brief:

  • Krub’s bow is totally clunky:

    • It is like a continue “oscillation” between zoom and not-zoom;

    • Choose a “charged shot” is so “doubtful”… one second in advance and you obtain a “not-charged shot”, one second late and you obtain a “full-charged shot” or anyway you lose dps.

  • Talents:

    • KEEP 'EM COMING (reload speed): useless with bow;

    • Second line: MAKE 'EM BLEED is almost mandatory;

    • Third line: all talents are about headshots, so they are “not so useful” with Blunderbuss and Rep Gun. Moreover: Empire bow can still do decent headshots, but it isn’t so meant for this like Elf bow;

    • tHP line: totally not appropriate for Huntsman… he has the worst tHP regen;

    • Last line: all lackluster talents that can’t compensate the active’s disadvantages… for example Huntsman’s active is the only one that can’t gain 50 tHP.

45

I agree… I don’t like talk about the other ranged careers into this thread (would be ot), also because I think they are well balanced (except Ranger, that needs some buff)… but if there are some careers that fill a “role”, it isn’t enough to be good, but they must be competitive, with advantages and disadvantages, and this is the problem.

As I have already said, would be possibile write a book about this… but to be brief: BH has enough crits to obtain infinite ammunition and to kill almost everything with a bodyshot; some weapons are still bosses/specials killers and also a crowd control ones (like BoP and Volley). WS has hagbane that melts bosses and crowd (and she has an active with a cooldown short enough to kill specials), she also has an incredible arrows regen; Pyro: tremendously versatile; the heat system is better than ammunation system, etc etc… Regardless talk about weapons, because I think that Spear/Rapier/Falchion are all better weapons for a ranged career than Kruber ones. (but I repeat: they are perfectly balanced, I am NOT asking for a nerf).

Huntsman is a single target killer (his active, his talents like MAKE ‘EM BLEED and MAKIN’ IT LOOK EASY, are meant to do great damage vs an huge enemy) with less agility, less survivability, less crowd control power… but in reality he does NOT deal a greater damage. And want we say that to obtain a good ammunitions regen Huntsman must give up to his “dealing damage” talents?

He need to get THP

True. His tHP talents aren’t appropriate for his style.

His ULT need to Spike his damage

I agree. The active is clunky (for the reasons explained into first post) and it doesn’t give us a real greater damage.

Increasing his Reload Speed Talent by 5% might be better

And mainly attack speed and reload speed must be “fixed”… it is ridicolous that reload speed doesn’t work with bow.

Headshots should be rewarded more than they currently are with increased fatalities, although someone will pipe up with “3 ammo back from each shot!” I think a HS built for anti Armour should take down a CW in 2 non-ult headshots.

We must choose between damage vs bosses (already poor) OR a decent ammunition regen. This is unfair.

As a wider discussion on Talents,- and interestingly Krubers classes prompted 2 discussion threads - There are definitely some Talents that feel like they’re on the wrong class. Merc is more tanky than FK, BH is a much better ranged threat than HS and so on.

Always to be brief (but they would need more words), I have written my opinion about talents into my previous post:

  • KEEP 'EM COMING (reload speed): useless with bow;
  • Second line: MAKE 'EM BLEED is almost mandatory;
  • Third line: all talents are about headshots, so they are “not so useful” with Blunderbuss and Rep Gun. Moreover: Empire bow can still do decent headshots, but it isn’t so meant for this like Elf bow;
  • tHP line: totally not appropriate for Huntsman… he has the worst tHP regen;
  • Last line: all lackluster talents that can’t compensate the active’s disadvantages… for example Huntsman’s active is the only one that can’t gain 50 tHP.
46

Xbow is pretty much equivalent to longbow though, except for a critbonus while aiming down and a slightly lower base reload speed.

Volley crossbow is basically hagbane but instead of a zone of AOE poison its more like a shotgun buckshot of arrows, that or a line of piercing bolts if talking the shade one.

Beamstaff is pretty good at all times i think, it just falls of at delaing with multiple opponents but its still good, might even be the best against mobile specials and stormvermin with shields, i´ve seen it work with chaos warriors as well.

As for abilities and careers, abilities are unique and shouldnt really be factored in if they have a significant cooldown, which waystalker´s trueflight barrage has, its not a strength that is available whenever needed.

Otherwise we´d argue that all of bounty hunters weapons are OP because he can oneshot a chaos warrior while carrying any weapon by using his ability.

And finally, handmaiden is not a tank, i have no idea why´d you think she is a tank even.

She only has above average extra health (bonus 25), she doesnt have any form of damage reduction or ability to ignore damage.

What she has, is higher than normal base power, extra dodge distance and stamina regen ontop of very low cooldown dash.

So what she is, is a mobile fighter, a damage dealer that specializes in melee but not to the same degree as the slayer.

So she still has a ranged weapon to support her team if needed, same as ironbreaker bardin, FK kruber or Zealot saltzpyre.

If you wana look for tanks, then look at Foot Knight Kruber, Ironbreaker Bardin, Zealot Saltzspyre, Unchained Sienna.

These guys have 150 base health, they have damage reduction, they can even ignore damage taken outright sometimes or they can block at no cost.

They all have skills that facilitate crowd control such as Zealots dash or Bardins taunt or Footknights all stunning charge.

Then finally there is the fact that the only one who can really use hagbane efficiently is the waystalker, this because she is the only one who can easily replenish the low ammo it has.

Handmaiden can use it but she is then a onetrick pony that has nothing left once its done until she can find an ammo pouch or box, which is a pretty boosted behavior in legend.

47

Beam is actually quite good agains bosses. Notas good as ball, but still.

48

Problem with beam is you lose “heat on target” every time teammate or enemy stands in a way. And you start heating up target from zero again. There should be a window of at least 1 second for heat to stay on target. Also, heat up speed should be buffed, or tied to something like attack speed, or ranged charge speed to make it interesting and variable.

49

Honestly I haven’t understood what you mean… Xbow isn’t stronger than Empire bow, but it becomes when used by BH and his autocrit. Sure, Volley xbow is very good, it has less damage to bosses than Hagbane but more versatility. And I have said that HM is a tank/crowd control… however, in both cases, she is a melee career; but it is enough the hagbane to make her also a bosses killer.

50

Ah i meant the waystalker longbow, crossbow on bounty hunter is basically the equivalent to waystalker longbow, aside from being a bit better Q_Q

Now you are correct, hagbane does do a really good boss damage burst if you burn all your ammo regardless of the user.

But you know? Others have similar stuff.

Saltzpyre’s brace of pistols, if you roll ammo refund on headshot and just shoot down the head then it does sky high damage too and very quickly ontop of refunding ammo, Sienna´s fire weapons do significant DPS as well.

Bardin´s drake pistols while not great are good still.

And the advantage all these have over the hagbane bow? Ammo sustain.

Hagbane by default has extremely little ammo with only 16 shots which actually limits the effective damage it does, it also has a fat hitbox for each arrow making landing headshots surprisingly difficult.

And my final comment on it, you should never actually use it that way unless you are either playing waystalker or have a ammo box nearby, deliberately burning through your ammo on legend is actually a seriously unskilled thing to do.

If a ammo box is present though? Everyone who uses ammo can fire away so go ahead.

51

I love how people are complaining about Krubers bow, meanwhile the Devs changed it to the Elf Longbow for like a month and everyone raged. :joy:

Can someone correct me on the line of thought in this thread? Seems to go like this, people who actually play the Elf Longbow think it’s fine and in a good place. Everyone else, it’s OP cause elf.

Kruber longbow is trash even though it can body shot elites with out a full investment of Power VS.

Xbow on Salty is OP even though it takes 4x Power VS armour/skaven to body shot SV without BH passive up.

52

I think heal on cleave or crit on cleave for huntsman lv 20 talent will be enough for him but for the other parts, he is fine imo

53

I wouldnt say its OP, its only elf level of good on BH, mostly because crit is oneshooting anything and with scrounger he have infinite ammo

54

Maybe you have misunderstood me. I haven’t problems with Hagbane, I think it is well balanced.

I was talking about that Huntsman does to few damage to bosses. Fatshark has over-nerfed him, and now his active hasn’t real advantages.

55

I don’t know if this message is for me, but I have not problems with Empire bow… I don’t like how we must choose between normal-charged and full-charged shot, it is not very intuitive, but I repeat: this is only the last problem, Fatshark can also leave it as now.

Then I do not think that Elf bow is op; moreover I think that, vs specials/elites, ranged careers are well balanced (Huntsman included)… I was talking only about vs bosses. I have done many tests and Huntsman seems to have the minor output damage (I repeat: vs bosses). And this is compounded by two factors: Huntsman has talents/active meant to do more damage vs huge targets and, in order to obtain a good ammunation regen, he must give up to MAKE ‘EM BLEED and MAKIN’ IT LOOK EASY.

56

I recently did some exploring with Huntsman to try and figure out how to get the most out of it. I had a lot of success but I eventually stopped because he just doesn’t bring as much to the table as other careers. I tested out Handgun and Longbow builds.

Observations
-His single target DPS is really, really good. Unfortunately, it’s nearly impossible to apply because your own party will either stand in the line of fire, or senselessly left click on all the elites making them jitter all over the place and ruining your headshots.
-Very rewarding at high skill, but very sensitive to party composition. Not a good character for Pugging. Which is very bad, because I think QP is probably like 99% of all games.
-Very squishy, so he needs a defensive weapon. Given the game mechanics, that means mobility.
That pretty much limits him to Sword or the DLC Mace and Sword.
-He seems slower then normal at swapping weapons. This is bad, because it means you can’t swap to Rifle/Bow to pick off elites out of a horde, you have to keep your melee out or you’re going to get smacked. Since several other classes excel at this task, lacking this ability reduces his role to sniping specials and Boss DPS.
-With only those two areas of strength, he’s not worth bringing to a group. He has too many weaknesses for that to be a worthwhile tradeoff.
-He’s actually pretty bad at covering the group from specials. His weapons/zoom times just don’t activate fast enough to compete with other classes. Aside from higher damage per shot (which isn’t needed, most specials are 1-shot anyway), he has nothing giving him an advantage even over non-ranged specs like Ironbreaker or Mercenary.
-He’s good DPS support with Make Em Bleed, but since the debuff is invisible nobody knows or cares.

Longbow Specific
-Crazy high DPS by finger rolling. Love it. Drops SV left and right.
-Zoom takes too long. I gave up on sniping specials because by the time I zoomed in on them, someone else already shot them.
-Picks off elites really well, until the horde gets into melee. Then you’re kind of locked there as a sub-par melee class since you can’t swap weapons quick enough.

Handgun Specific
-Sniper Extraordinaire. Being able to bodyshot specials is refreshing (I’m used to Elf LB)
-DPS during ult is insane. Chained headshots really are like a ranged shade. Sadly, you can’t do this often because bosses spin on a dime and you almost never get a clear shot toward their head. I think I got the opportunuty take advantage of this ability maybe 1 out of every 3 or 4 games.
-I may have figured out the hitscan issues; I think it’s lag related. When I make fast snap shots, the shot can be very unpredictable, very far beyond the crosshairs or just mysteriously not hitting anything. When I hold at least until the crosshairs start moving, the shots become reliable again.

Suggestions
-Buff his strengths (boss DPS) high enough to compensate for his weaknesses, or boost his weaknesses (melee, horde, mobility, THP) to make the strengths he already has a worthwhile trade. Given how unpredictable and fast bosses are, he needs less reliance on repeated headshots for his boss DPS.
-He should get a passive accuracy boost, or a class zoom ability like WS has to compensate for the long zoom in times.
-Or, change his role. Prowl is basically identical to Infiltrate, only weaker. To mix it up, instead of making it apply to multiple attacks, make it apply to only 1 hit but make it’s cooldown much much shorter, like 30 seconds. This would be ideal for disengaging from a horde and popping off an elite, CW or Special that’s threatening the group.

57

ah.

Well i dont think he´s really bad, he is just like the waystalker with longbow though, extremely headshot reliant but better at it while she is better in melee.

58

I agree. Sometimes I have heard players to say that it is enough to do always headshots in order to have a good dps, but:

  • objectively it is impossibile to do always headshot: bosses turn around like spins and they often give you their back and they do sudden movements;
  • anyway this would be much harder than any other ranged career playstyle without a consistent reward (because thanks to my tests I have seen that, also doing a good number of headshots, the damage vs bosses is lower);
59

I agree but only about “vs specials/elites”. WS is more versatile (much more), more agile, more “safe” than Huntsman… but she needs headshot.

While I totally don’t agree about “vs bosses”. If WS uses Hagbane, she melts bosses (and thanks to her ammunation regen and her fast active she can still do a great damage to specials/elites): so more dps vs bosses than HS;
If WS uses Longbow, she does same damage as Huntsman (more or less)… but this is unfair, because HS is “more uncomfortable” and he has talets/active meant to do more damage vs huge targets.

But I repeat: WS is well balanced, I do NOT want a nerf.

60

Ah well the weapons question is a difficult one for huntsman, while waystalker has her multipurpose hagbane bow i heard he has the blunderbluss which…is only really good for bosses and nothing else really.

Not such a good thing, it would be fairly nice if huntsman had a similar multi purpose weapon that was generally fairly good but also very good with bosses.

…Then again, Bardin doesnt have that either.

But when it comes to WS longbow vs Huntsman longbow i think huntsman does more damage because his talents just result in more headshot damage compared to her, along with higher base power even if slower.

Neither longbow is really any good if you cant get any headshots though, and WS is kinda better in melee-